Hi, Recently I asked some questions about having my old laptop backed up before taking it on a trip. Update is that I decided to take a shot at doing it myself after all, but want to run my choice by you for peace of mind. I got a USB external hard drive and it is plenty fast and seems fine. I didn't have a lot of choices anyway, because my laptop is a very basic, 5 or 6 year old model and even the manufacturer, Toshiba, couldn't say for sure what it would be compatible with (i.e., the processor is only Pentium MMX which I think is 233 Mhz). And I wasn't aiming for bells & whistles, such as a CD burner, since I have little room and few system resources left and wanted something with no or little software to install. The point being, for this laptop, "good enough is good enough," and it would be so much easier to just keep the drive I've ended up with. All I really want is to be as sure as possible that I've preserved my precious documents in the most lasting way; and that I didn't spend **way** more than I needed to ($179). * 1] The brand I got is Western Digital, ext. USB hard drive. Is that a good brand? Not known for problems? 2] I guessed at the size I'd need -- got 120 GB, then realized my whole laptop is 4 GB! Is there anything better about having a size closer to what you'll actually need/use (besides lower cost)? I gather that unless you specifically pay more for smaller, portable ones, the desktop ones are actually the same physical size within any brand and don't get bigger or smaller according to data storage size... 3] Often, my computer crashes and/or freezes up, sometimes requiring turning off at the switch. (That in itself isn't what I'm asking for help with right now -- I write it off to a unit so far gone that it can't even be effectively defragged anymore, and isn't worth putting $$ into). Will having crashes and restarts with the external drive plugged in be a *particularly* bad thing? Meaning, should I be careful to disconnect it as soon as I'm done with it each time? I ask because I saw that the plug shouldn't be pulled out without clicking on an icon to "Unplug Hardware;" and also was thinking this might be similar to a power surge... *4] I see that the expected life of most external hard drives seems to be listed as 5 years, which I think is in "power on" hours. If I leave it off most of the time, can I probably expect it to last a lot longer than that? Is five years pretty conservative, maybe even if left on a lot? (This will help me decide whether to keep the model I just got, which has way more storage space than I can imagine needing anytime soon). Thanks much! :^ )

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking. Western digital is a great brand, with great history. Having a large drive doesn't hurt anything. I WOULD run this drive some, rather than let it sit for weeks/months on end with no use. I've got drives out of used computers here that are a LOT older than 5 yrs old, although most stuff I've got isn't/hasn't been used in a 24/7 environment. If there is a "disable" software feature for hot plugging this device, I'd use it. As far as crashes, could be software, could be memory, or a hdd problem. Yes, could take a little doing to find it. May or may not be worth the trouble, just depends on how bad the crashes are, and how much they intrude on your use.

I think having a crash while writing to an external drive is more likely to corrupt the external drive. As 'name' suggests it would be better to find the cause of the crashes.

Thanks! And true, I don't always make it clear what I'm asking! Drive size: the main thing I meant was, does the physical size of a desktop model within a given brand correspond to its data storage size? WD told me 'no,' by phone. Said that even if I exchanged the 120 GB for 80 GB, or maybe 40 in another brand, the unit itself wouldn't get smaller (unless I actually paid *more* for a "portable" or "pocket" unit). Smaller is better to me, especially since I realized I don't *need* anywhere near this much storage. BUT only if it corresponds to selecting lower data storage size, and not to paying *for* smaller physical size. The crashes: To save space I won't get into why, but I'm resigned to them, and wasn't asking about those in themselves. And, I don't think a crash will happen within the seconds it takes to copy data to the ext. drive. The way my crashes tend to happen is when 'net surfing, or sometimes word processing. Or, when not in use, it sometimes goes to sleep and never comes out. Anyway, pretend I know I won't crash during backup. My question was, will it be bad for the external hard drive to simply be plugged in when it happens as I do something else, and then bring the computer back up? It does say it's hot pluggable, but for removal you're supposed to use an "Unplug Hardware" instruction first. So should I disconnect it most of the time; and/or at least disconnect it as I restart after crash? Product life: how *do* people make themselves secure that their data will last as long as possible? If there's even a chance five years is accurate for this new drive, I'll stop trusting it at 4 years and keep getting new ones. I don't know how to get this in perspective. Do you have to have two storage methods with identical back ups to be sure? And, is running it for a few hours a week better than, say, for just a few minutes per week or month (which is all I'd actually need)? I have no clue. (That's making me wonder about how I've had this old laptop on -- without shutting down more than minutes ever -- for about four years straight! Is that bad??) Sorry, all this probably wasn't any clearer! :